9/20/2009

Where have all the good comic book stores gone?

I finally discovered a Filbar's branch while wondering around Pasay yesterday. For those who don't shop for comic books in the Philippines, Filbar's was once the largest retail chain of comic book stores. Back in the early nineties when Image comics was moving ludicrous quantities of issue #1s, Filbar's could be found in every major shopping center. I remember going to every store trying to chase down copies of Jim Lee's initial run on WildC.A.T.s (Don't laugh at me). When my tastes changed, I started to gravitate towards Filbar's biggest rival Comic Quest (CQ), mainly visiting the branch located in SM Megamall. Looking back with an indie-loving/manga-centric point of view, there were never any really good comic book stores at the time, only stores with varying degrees of inadequacy. As the fortunes of the comic book industry in America turned from good to bad, and from bad to worse, so did Filbar's and the local . Every year I returned to Manila I would learn of more comic book stores closures. I dropped by the CQ Megamall branch when attending the Metro Comic Con and discovered it had moved to a smaller, less prominent, location within the mall. Its stock was more fixated on the Big Two. But the Filbar's branch I saw was a newsstand with some comic books sold behind the counter. I have yet to visit the branches in Makati, since I've lately preferred to patronize the bookstore economy. But overall the comics I'm interested in are getting harder to find.